IBM rolls out data analytics offerings

International Business Machines (IBM) has unveiled three services to help companies sift through and understand so-called 'big data', hoping to get some of the $120 billion or more that businesses are expected to invest in data analytics by 2015, Reuters reports.

IBM, which has spent $14 billion on acquisitions to grow its analytics business since 2005, said it aimed to target top executives with its new offers of software and services to reduce fraud, manage financial performance and predict customer behaviour.

It sees strong growth opportunities as companies, governments and organisations struggle to make sense of the large volume of data available.

Dubbed Smarter Analytics Signature Solutions, IBM says the offerings are the result of dozens of acquisitions involving predictive analysis, innovations from IBM Research and “more than 20 000 analytics engagements”, eWeek reveals.

Now, IBM is using that work to help businesses combat fraud, improve customer service and achieve new levels of financial visibility.

Unlocking big data's value is opening up new frontiers in IT – and new markets, too. IBM points to a bullish IDC forecast that says businesses will pour $120 billion into analytics hardware, software and services by 2015.

IBM, which has a long history of analysing data, began growing the segment almost a decade ago when the costs of computing started to drop, The Times of India notes.

It now anticipates $16 billion in business analytics revenue in 2015. “It's not just that we discovered more data could be good, it's become more economical,” says Steve Mills, who heads IBM's software and systems unit.